Author: Rachel Burger

Let’s be honest: if you’re a content marketer, you don’t spend most of your time writing. Yes, you might be consumed with a new article or blog post here or there, but in order to write that piece of content you have to become an expert at whatever topic is at hand. Then you have to promote it, repurpose it, and even pitch it out to external outlets.

In other words, most content marketers are really researchers and promoters, and maybe a hobbyist writer.

Tough words to hear, I know.

Luckily, there is one tool that is exceptional at cutting down on research time for any topic. It can also help pinpoint leads for guest posts.

That tool is Mozbar, an SEO extension for Google and Firefox. These two Mozbar hacks rethink the way the tool can be used beyond just SEO and into content strategy.

I’m a big fan of automation nation, so I took the time to figure out the best Twitter tools to increase followers in 2015 (now 2017), to always have new content filtering through my feed, and to encourage engagement.

The secret is that these articles are not focused on what’s interesting. Think about it: when you say “That’s interesting,” are you really saying that you want to dive more into a topic, or that it entertained your brain long enough to move on to something else? My bet is the latter. Good content is not necessarily interesting.

Good content is helpful, focused on the reader, and evergreen. In other words, your blog’s goal should be to assist your readers for as long as Google is the dominating search engine.

The biggest problems with new blogs isn’t a lack of content or even good design. It’s poorly chosen topics and sloppy posts.

Luckily, you don’t have to be caught in this trap. There are an amazing number of free content curation tools that can help you stay on top of what’s going on in your industry–and I’ve picked out the best of the best. You can also use these tools to determine what to share on social media and save for later.